Low cost easy-care sheep within reach

How much more appealing would sheep farming be if you eliminated the dagging, crutching, fly strike prevention/treatment, and shearing took under half the time.

Many of these management issues add significant costs and with farm expenditure rising by over 4% annually, lowering these costs will improve profits and the quality of sheep farming.

While income from wool has improved significantly this year, sheep bred without bellies and bare rear ends would only lose the lower value part of the product. Savings would also be made with less shedhands needed to prepare the wool for sale.

The use of ram lambs for mating and then disposed of for meat, is another innovative idea that would improve profits by lowering the loss in capital cost of a second hand ram, and improving the genetic renewal rate. Good practical ideas from scientifically proven research that could improve sheep farmers profits.

Farmers can breed a low-cost, easy care sheep themselves, AgResearch scientist David Scobie told Beef + Lamb NZ's Eastern and Western North Island Farmer Councils science day in Palmerston North. The Lincoln-based scientist has been on a mission to make sheep easier to farm, by having less dags, and being easier to shear than their woolly-bellied and woolly tail-end counterparts reports The Manawatu Standard.

Dr Scobie said a low-cost, easy-care sheep can be bred from genes already in the sheep flock. He has spent 10 years reasearching sheep that cost less to farm. They have short tails, a bare rear-end and no wool on their underbellies. Having no wool on their bottom and belly means the new sheep are less likely to suffer fly-strike.He also said shearing is easier, with shearers not going near the udder, or hamstrings, which can easily be cut on a sheep.

He said farmers can breed the bare sheep themselves from the enormous gene pool that exists in NZ. Dr Scobie said traits such as tail length, clearness under the tail, and belly are characteristics with high heriditability from the ewes and rams."Lots of farmers like to dock lamb's tails short. It is not optimum. There needs to be a short tail left. If it's too short, the sheep can't lift the tail up, and you get more dags as a result."

He said farmers should cull daggy ewes, and choose rams that are very clean as 20 per cent of dagginess is due to the animals that have been chosen to mate. And Dr Scobie said there was five times less flystrike on ewes and rams that had bare backsides. Dr Scobie also said to help keep costs down, farmers should consider using ram lambs for mating, and then cut their heads off. While wool returns are still a significant part of sheep income, some farmers would prefer sheep with less wool on their breech and belly. Farmers are prepared to have a slightly lower fleece weight in exchange for reduced costs and easier management.

Dr Scobie said one of the downsides of breeding easy-care sheep that don't require dagging and are quicker to shear is that they have less wool. "But if they are using protein for wool growth, then it is not available for meat growth."Chairman of the science day William Morrison said when he thought back, people had been selecting for growth rate of sheep, which was a far less heriditability trait, at about 0.4 – or 4 per cent. "We can make progress on these easy-care areas quickly because they have high heriditability," he said.